When I was considering becoming a Christian about a year and a half ago, one of my most nagging hindrances was the question of how much I would have to “give up” and how much I could “keep” to pursue the Christian life. The Bible didn’t really seem to provide a satisfying answer. It talked a lot about what to forsake, some of which seemed obvious (guilt, jealously, ill-will), and some of which seemed troubling (family, homes, possessions), and it talked about what to seek (fruits of the spirit), which was also pretty obvious, but it never seemed to speak towards the “keep/forsake” balance I was seeking.
Observing other professing Christians didn’t help me either. Some professing Christians I knew wore rings of purity and had avoided pre-marital sex, whereas others I knew had done no such thing. Some professing Christians listened to weird songs that talked about Jesus all the time, whereas some listened to the exact same music that I did. Some professing Christians talked about Christ constantly whereas others mentioned him only if asked. I was frustrated because no matter how hard I looked, I could find no answer describing an appropriate balance.
A year and a half later, I’m beginning to realize why I could never find answer: There is no “appropriate amount” of Christ to be sought. I want to avoid balance at all costs and gorge myself on as much of God as I can get my hands on.
I know this may sound immature, or even maniacal, but I have found, through both scripture and personal experience, that we are built to run on the fuel that is God. Running on anything else is like putting sawdust in the gas tank of our car. I have also found that the more I experience of God, the more I hunger for more of Him.
If you really think about it, we, as humans, are hard-wired to seek our own happiness at the root of every action. Blaise Pascal puts it perfectly:
“All men seek happiness. This is without exception. Whatever different means they employ, they all tend to this end. The cause of some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is the same desire in both, attended with different views. The will never takes the least step but to this object. This is the motive of every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves.”
I have tried so hard to come up with an objection to this. I’ve said things like, “Well, maybe my ultimate desire is to leave as positive impact on the world”, but even that idea is ultimately traceable back to pure happiness. Why would I want to positively impact the world? Because it gives me a feeling of fulfillment. Why a feeling of fulfillment? Because it makes me happy.
Or, even if I were to ascribe to myself the most philanthropic of motives and say, “I do this not for myself, but for others. Others don’t even have food”, my objection still crumbles. What’s wrong with not having food? It makes you starve. Why is starving undesirable? Because it makes one very unhappy. Because it makes one very unhappy, don’t you mean very dead? Sure it does, the prospect of which makes one very unhappy. So you’re working to fulfill others’ primal hunger for happiness? Yes, and doing so makes me very happy. Phew, It’s unavoidable!
Throughout the past few months, I’ve realized that the only thing that can satisfy our innate aching for happiness and satisfaction is God. C.S. Lewis says,
God designed the human machine to run on Himself. He Himself is the fuel our spirits were designed to burn, or the food our spirits were designed to feed on. There is no other. That is why it is just no good asking God to make us happy in our own way without bothering about religion. God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.
That is the key to history. Terrific energy is expended—civilizations are built up—excellent institutions devised; but each time something goes wrong. Some fatal flaw always brings the selfish and cruel people to the top and it all slides back into misery and ruin. In fact, the machine conks. It seems to start up all right and runs a few yards, and then it breaks down. They are trying to run it on the wrong juice.
Well put, Lewis! Sometimes I wish I could come up with stuff like that! All throughout scripture, God has led me to the fact that we are to possess an absolute zeal for Him and that that zeal is the only thing that can satisfy us. Psalm 42:1 says, “As the deer pants for water, so my soul pants for you” and Psalm 37:4 tells us to “delight ourselves in God”. The Psalmist in Psalm 119 even says God’s words are “sweeter than honey.” (Psalm 119:103)
What breaks my heart is that I see so much dissatisfaction around me, yet many people cannot realize that the things of this world will not ultimately satisfy them! I literally don’t think I’ve ever heard of somebody buying a working TV and being completely satisfied with that TV when the newer model comes out. I noticed this dissatisfaction all throughout my years of competitive running before I became a Christian. I would finally run the “satisfying race” I had been dreaming of, only to find that it was a mere 48 hours before I was no longer satisfied with that time. Yes, good things can be said about that general competitive process, but I don’t think I ever thought to myself, “I will be completely satisfied if I never run faster – everything from here on out is a bonus.”
This idea is, of course, is found again and again in the Bible. The prophet Jeremiah lamented that his people “committed two evils: they have forsaken the fountain of living water, and have hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water.” (Jeremiah 2:11-13). Zopher, in his conversation with a saddened Job, tells him, “Don’t you know that ever since antiquity, from the time man was placed on earth…the happiness of the Godless has lasted for only a moment?” (Job 20:4-6).
It is such a joy to feast on God, one because it ends my cycle of dissatisfaction, and two, because God tastes really, really good! I wrote a blog a few months ago (“Noah and the iPod") about deleting every song I had on my iPod and replacing them with only Christian music. At the time, I was still unsure of whether it would actually be satisfying, and the blog itself was written more as an experiment to see if God could truly make me happy. I am thrilled to report back, just a few months later, that I am so incredibly happy I made that decision. I can’t imagine going back to my old music; it simply doesn’t satisfy.
If you’re reading this and you’ve known me for years, you most likely think I’ve gone crazy. I am totally fine with that. I love the lyrics to the Flame song “Joyful Noise”: “Now me and my boys, we could be in a psych ward, cause we went crazy for God our lives were scarred.” The first Christians were described by onlookers as crazy and as having had too much wine (Acts 2:13).
This is not to say that there is absolutely no room for anything else in life. After all, I love to watch a good Phillies game, take a long nap, and indulge in the other little pleasures of our short time here on earth. This is to say, however, that since I’ve tasted how sweet God, his word, and his story are, I have been completely captured and obsessed with them.
When Jesus tells his disciples (and us) to give up a worldly passion, he’s not just testing them to see who is legit; rather, he has their own best interests in mind! It’s always funny when we use the story of Jesus telling the man to sell all his possessions (Luke 18:22) as proof of what following Christ looks like. That man never ended up following Jesus! A better story is the parable of the man who found that God was like hidden treasure buried in a field, who then, in his joy, sold all he had to get that other treasure!” (Matthew 13:44). The man couldn’t fathom owning his old treasure when he saw how great the new treasure was!
A college pastor at Alabama, Chris Brooks, said “if I don’t live, eat, and breathe his mission and message, I am going into a catatonic depression.” At the time I thought he was insane, but now I see exactly what he is saying. The steadfast love of God is better than life (Psalm 63:3).
To all my Christian friends: let’s mutually encourage each other to put gasoline in our gas tanks, not sawdust. We will run so much better off of it.
To all my non-Christian friends: I used to think this stuff was crazy too, but now that I’ve tasted it, it tastes really, really stinkin’ good.
